Dr. Gridlock: October 31, 2010 - November 6, 2010

No big rallies or runs this weekend, but transit riders should be aware of the maintenance disruptions on three of Metro's rail lines. The Capitals and Wizards will be playing at Verizon Center, and the Greater Washington Heart Walk is scheduled for Saturday at Nationals Park. Travelers should find the weekend weather crisp and mostly clear.

So far, most of the visible work on the District's biggest transportation project has been done in the middle of the Anacostia River and on its east bank. Now, drivers on the Southeast-Southwest Freeway are going to get close to the construction of the new 11th Street Bridge.
Over the next two weeks, contractors are scheduled to drive piles in the freeway median east of 11th Street SE.

An engine pulling private cars collided with a MARC train on Friday morning, according to Dave Clark, a spokesman for the Maryland Transit Administration . There were no passengers aboard either train, he said. A portion of the MARC train derailed.
The Maryland Area Regional Commuter service is Maryland's commuter rail operation, which runs on three lines, the Brunswick, Frederick and Penn Lines.

The clocks fall back an hour at 2 a.m. Sunday as Daylight Saving Time ends, but for Metrorail riders, that's the easy part of the clock-watching this weekend. Metro turns back its clocks along with everyone else. All the homeward bound partiers need to remember is that Metrorail will continue operating till 3 a.m. Eastern Standard Time.
The trickier part of weekend transit planning will be tracking the train schedules late Friday and early Saturday, as Metro prepares to shut down segments of the Orange and Blue lines for a big weekend maintenance project.

Riders ask if they can have any say about what the next generation of rail cars will look like. Metro says the answer is yes, and it will happen over the next year and a half.
But riders have very different ideas about what is comfortable and efficient in a car design. It's unlikely the final design will make everyone happy.

11 a.m. Update: The suspicious package has been cleared and streets have reopened. Original post: Fourteenth Street NW is blocked between Rhode Island Avenue and Q Street due to an investigation of a suspicious package....

John B. Catoe Jr., the former Metro general manager who left in April following the deadliest year in history for the transit agency, will have a new role advising the contractor that operates MetroAccess.
MV Transportation, the California-based contractor that runs the transit service for the disabled for Metro, has hired Catoe as an adviser to its executive leadership team. The company announced the hiring on Monday, according to a press release. The news was first reported in the Washington area by WTOP.

For Metro and other rail agencies fall isn't the best of times.
It's the season when millions of fallen leaves can cause service delays for railroads and subways across the country as residue on the rails necessitates speed restrictions for safety reasons. Fallen leaves get crushed against rails by railcar wheels, depositing a residue that decreases friction, which can cause slipping.

5:35 p.m. Update: The signal problem has been fixed, VRE said. Train 331 is running 25 minutes late. Train 309 is 15 minutes late. Later trains should be on time, officials said. Original post: A signal problem at Union Station...

The Maryland Transit Administration says all northbound Camden Line trains may experience delays Thursday of 10 to 15 minutes between Washington and Greenbelt due to speed restrictions in the area. Track work was performed in that section today. The MTA...

Metro and Montgomery County officials have rolled out their snow plows as a test for the upcoming winter. Friday is D.C.'s turn. Crews from the District's departments of transportation and public works will meet up at RFK Stadium before deploying...

Metro's anticipating an $89 million budget deficit, but along the San Diego-Tijuana border, drug dealers appear to have had no trouble financing their own operational rail system, which carted marijuana along an 1,800-foot tunnel.

A preliminary investigation into the escalator failure at L'Enfant Plaza Station followed last weekend's Jon Stewart/Stephen Colbert rally, when the system broke a 19-year record for Saturday ridership, has determined that the escalator brakes failed, causing the unit to speed up and dumping the riders at the bottom.

Metro's financial staff says that bus and rail revenues are below projections. The results from the first quarter of Metro's fiscal year are within 2 percent below what they should be to meet the budget for the 2011 fiscal year, according to a report prepared for the Metro board.

The team of companies building Metro's expanded wireless phone network have said they cannot meet an Oct. 2012 deadline set by Congress without dozens of new safety escorts to increase their ability to lay fiber optic cable and conduct other work on Metro's rail tracks, Metro officials said on Thursday.

The transit authority staff, now developing the Metro budget for next year, is hoping to do it without increasing fares or cutting bus and rail service, but that will be difficult. Among other financial challenges, Metro anticipates growth of 10 percent in the ridership on the costly MetroAccess service for elderly and disabled people.

Military leaders gathered at Fort Belvoir early Thursday for the base's annual community breakfast, a post-election tradition that in recent years has turned into a pulpit for officials to tout, and defend, the Defense Department's costly and complicated plans for next year's base closures and changes.

Riders want the Metro fare system to be simpler and more flexible, said Carol Kissal, Metro's finance chief, reporting to a Metro board committee this morning on the results of focus groups with riders. The board is reviewing what it refers to as its fare principles, the guidelines it tries to follow in setting fares and fare policy.

A funeral procession for a D.C. police officer who died after a car crash Oct. 30 is expected to disrupt traffic in Virginia and the District Thursday afternoon.
Officer Paul Dittamo, 32, was responding to a call when the car he was driving crashed into a utility pole, according to police. He was later pronounced dead at a hospital.
The funeral procession for Dittamo, the first D.C. police officer to die in the line of duty since 2007, will depart St. Elizabeth Ann Seton Catholic Church in Lake Ridge, Va., at about 12:30 p.m. Thursday to the District, police said. The procession will travel pass the 7th District police station where Dittamo was assigned and then return to Virginia to the burial site in Manassas. Expect street closures along the route, and police warn that drivers should expect heavy traffic.
Here is the route:

The National Transportation Safety Board is planning a public forum on aging drivers for next week.
According to NTSB Chairman Deborah A.P. Hersman, "there are more than 30 million licensed drivers in the U.S. who are 65 years of older, and in just 15 years, this age group of drivers will comprise than 20 percent of the entire U.S. driving population.
"The NTSB has a particular interest in learning how to reduce injury risk in car accidents for drivers in this age category," she said in a statement.

It promises to be a wet commute Thursday morning, according to the forecast from the Capital Weather Gang. "Moderate rain" will affect your travels. Check the Dr. Gridlock blog for the latest on conditions on the roads and rails, and...

The Maryland Transit Administration says all northbound Camden Line trains may experience delays of 10 to 15 minutes between Washington and Greenbelt. Speed restrictions are in place due to track work. From the Post's archives: MARC riders on Brunswick Line...

UPDATE: The suspicious vehicle is said to be a camper parked on Jefferson Drive in front of the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum, according to reporter Fredrick Kunkle. Sgt. David Schlosser with the U.S. Park Police said the agency's...

Many Red Line riders think the trains are slowing down between Bethesda and Friendship Heights. It's not their imagination.
Metro inspectors have identified a section of track in that area that needs repair. That's not an unusual condition in the aging rail system. The transit authority schedules repairs, and until they can be completed, orders trains to slow down as they pass through the zone as a safety precaution.

Virginia Railway Express plans to conduct an emergency drill on Nov. 13 and is seeking volunteers to play the role of victims in a simulated train disaster. The commuter rail agency uses the exercise to text the response of personnel...

Virginia Railway Express is holding an online discussion with Chief Executive Officer Dale Zehner Wednesday at noon. The chat is scheduled to last for an hour. Visit vre.org/chatterbox to follow the chat or to submit questions....

[This post has been updated] Beach Drive is scheduled to be closed Wednesday from 9:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. so that crews can do emergency work on manholes. Beach will be closed from Rock Creek Parkway to Klingle Road NW,...

Metro has a federally imposed deadline in two years to have cell service accessible to Verizon, AT&T, Sprint and T-Mobile customers throughout its rail system. A team from the cell providers is working to expand the reach of the signals...

5:57 p.m. Update: The fire at the Windsor House Apartments at 1444 Rhode Island Ave. NW broke out about 4:40 p.m., said Pete Piringer, a spokesman for the D.C. fire and rescue department. The blaze broke out on the ninth...

5:18 p.m. Update: Two crashes -- including one that critically injured a man in his 40s -- have significantly slowed traffic on Route 301 in the Brandywine area, according to police and fire officials. The more serious crash occurred at...

The chill in the air this fall -- okay, it was downright cold last night -- had some of us at Gridlock Central talking recently about our favorite commuting routes. Someone mentioned the drive down the BW Parkway; another person...

3:50 P.M. UPDATE: The estimate for the repair on Pennsylvania Avenue is still 7 p.m. An eight-inch main also broke on W Street between 13th and 14th streets NW. W Street westbound is closed to traffic. D.C. Water estimates repairs...

Metro is anticipating that it may have an $89 million budget deficit for fiscal year 2012. That's the agency's next budget year, which begins on July 1, 2011.
The news was first reported on the Greater Greater Washington blog by David Alpert and Michael Perkins.
The information is detailed in an item scheduled to be considered by Metro's finance and administration committee on Thursday. The general manager presents a budget proposal for the coming fiscal year to the board in January, and Metro staff is seeking guidance on the budgeting process.

Don't be alarmed if you see snow plows traveling the 5,000 miles of county-maintained roads in Montgomery County on Wednesday. It may feel like it should be snowing but the crews won't actually be plowing or laying salt. They'll be...

7:30 p.m. Update: Metro says the problem has been cleared. Original post: A switch malfunction outside of Huntington Station in Northern Virginia is causing delays in both directions on the Yellow Line. Switches allow trains to be guided from one...

JetBlue Airways launched service Monday at Reagan National Airport with daily flights to Boston and Florida.The airline offered limited seats between Washington and Boston's Logan Airport at $49 each way in a sale that ends Thursday. The promotion covers travel...

4:45 p.m. Update: The accident is now blocking the northbound acceleration lane. The traffic lanes are open, according to Maryland traffic information. Original post: U.S. 301 northbound is closed at Brandywine Road in Prince George's County due to an accident....

Metrorail's average Saturday ridership is about 350,000. The day of the Rally to Restore Sanity and/Fear it was 825,437, officials said, surpassing a 1991 rally celebrating Operation Desert Storm. Metro ridership averages about 750,000 each weekyday. The most trips for...

Yes. But that was the easy question. The more difficult questions are whether different planning could have produced a different outcome and whether some of the most frequently recommended solutions would be worth the investment.

The maximum pre-tax amount for employees' Metrobenefits is set to return to $120 from $230, and a company that administers many pre-tax employee benefits is mounting a campaign to get riders to lobby Congress to extend the benefit.

It may be November, but there are still plenty of traffic and transit changes coming for commuters in the D.C. area. I-95 in Northern Virginia is wider, the timing of the reversible lanes is different, Metro is planning another big weekend shutdown. Here are some of the highlights.